Monday, November 1, 2010

In late Winter, when cabin-fever has reached its peak, I pour over seed catalogs, gardening magazines and I make seed tape. Seed tape is ultra-easy and really great for your teeny-tiny seeds - such as carrots.

EASY SEED TAPE:
You will need a roll of toilet paper, flour, water, a popsicle stick or small brush, wax paper, a Sharpie & small ruler, tweezers and your seeds. Spread wax paper on a large flat surface. Roll out toilet paper into strips (later you can tear/cut your strips to shorter lengths if preferred). Read your seed packet to see what your seed spacing when planted should be...measure & mark with dots on your toilet paper. Mix flour and water in a small bowl to a medium-thick oatmeal consistency. This is your "glue". Dab or brush a tiny amount onto your dot-marks. With your fingers or tweezers, carefully place your seeds on your glue dots. I usually put a few seeds on each as I want to ensure germination and I can always thin later in the garden once they have sprouted. Let dry thoroughly and store in a dry, dark place (I usually place in a shoebox in a closet).

So back to carrots - this year I planted hundreds because we love them fresh, frozen, in soups & stews and they are ultra-easy to grow.

I chose to split my harvest into two rounds a few weeks apart and two days ago (just in the nick of time before the snowfall), I pulled the last of my carrots. Harvesting root vegetables is very satisfying for me - something about carefully loosening the soil and pulling treasures from the earth is a simple delight. There are always little surprises as well - some carrots hit a rock while growing and adapt by growing around the object into funny odd shapes. They certainly are not the perfect gems you see at market but are still edible and make me smile.

As I mentioned, we use carrots in all sorts of ways - some are washed, cut, peeled and eaten fresh as a snack or in salads. Carrots like all root vegetables store well but I find its super easy and fast to prep & freeze them for later use.

FREEZING CARROTS

Brush the majority of soil from your carrots and then wash really well

Chop your carrots - chop the greens end off and make sure

to throw out any "bad looking areas"

my pup LOVES carrots

she gets very excited when the chopping begins

Blanch your carrots

This is a very important step when freezing vegetables

Take a large pot, bring water to boiling,

dump in carrots and blanch for 2 minutes

Note: Blanching time varies by vegetable and their chopped size

Remove your carrots from the boiling water immediately
and place in icewater bath
this cools them down quickly so that they do not continue to cook
let the carrots cool down completely

place cool carrots into a freezer bag or container
make sure to remove all excess air before sealing
place in your freezer & enjoy